Sunday, March 14, 2010

There are a lot of comics that xkcd makes that ask the bold question: What would happen if certain people were replaced by young, sarcastic, smug, leet haxoring people closely modeled on Randall Munroe's ideal view of himself?

Anyway, today's comic asks, what if this ideal sarcastic nerd figure were in space?? Clearly, the answer to this question is that they would mess around with their internet connection for a while, until they were able to get some advertisement to accidentally say something illogical. Right?

That is the point of the comic - these ads are clearly lying, and if you have an unusual IP address you can make them say silly things like this. What I don't see is how that constitutes "messing with advertisers". I imagine that behind every internet ad is a large greasy man in a small dark room, with piles of money everywhere. This man does not give a shit if some sarcastic 20-something astronaut figures this out. Why would he? The point is to get people to the website. Is this astronaut more or less likely to go to the website because of this? Who knows? Probably it makes no difference. Probably someone who knows these ads are BS is not likely to visit the website anyway.

Anyways, in my imagination, I see the guy from this comic being really proud of himself for the rest of the mission and no one else on earth or near earth giving a fuck ever or even thinking about it again.

=======================GUYS: Perhaps you have forgotten that my CONTEST is still ongoing? I have decided to keep the contest open for entries for an additional 10 days or so, because I am arbitrary and cruel like that. But also so that I could remember to put in on reddit and hopefully attract some more competitors. so upvote it, you people.

=======================I think boy wonder Person #1 is going to guest post in a week. Just so you are all aware.=======================I love Kate Beaton's comics and frequently remind all of you of that fact, and I love her fat ponycomics, as do all reasonable people, and so I was of course excited to hear that I would soon be able to buy one. But if that little dude actually costs $50 as some people are reporting, why, that is just crazy! I do not see how anyone would buy that unless they were really just trying to donate to the site. I know they are hard to make and are made by hand, but that doesn't mean people will want to pay large amounts for them! Well maybe I am wrong, maybe everyone will want to buy them.

ATTENTION MS. BEATON: If you send me a free Fat Pony, I will be more than happy to write a review of your product for this blog. It will get lots of attention and I will link to your store.

Posted by
Carl

107 comments:

Yes, this'd be interesting if he could make other people see those ads, or make the advertisers aware of it somehow. But that isn't the case. No one will see it besides the hacker himself, in which case he might as well just photoshop an image of the ad for all the effect it would have.

Ok, I guess the hot female astronaut floating next to him will also see it (you can't tell she's hot, but knowning Randall, she's probably supposed to be). She's probably thinking along the lines of "this space station cost a hundred billion dollars to construct, and *this* is how you're using it? That's it, I'm putting you on the next Soyuz flight home." (actually, if that had been the alt-text I might've actually liked the comic).

The big flaw in this joke is the middle panel. The only one the astronaut is 'messing with' is his fellow astronaut and himself. They are the only ones using that IP, and as such, they are the only ones who will see that ad.

It'd be much better if it was someone on earth who got the ISS's downlink into a GeoIP database to mess with astronauts. Like Carl said: not only do the advertisers not give a shit, they won't even see that someone messed with the ad. The only ones who will ever see this are the astronauts, so they should be the ones the jokes are played on.

But of course due to Randall's complete inability to construct a joke, he missed out on that fact. His thought process probably halted at "Astronauts are smart people so they will do the hacking."

713 was relatively okay. It wasn't great. It only made me smile a little bit because I actually know the ads.

But 714 just pissed me off. Panel 1 seems to be a far-fetched set up for a hypothetically very funny comment. Panel 2 actually repeats panel 1 for this with an IQ less than their shoe sizes (in US size, mind you!). Panel 3 is a build-up, coming to a climax. Oh, boy, something unexpected is coming here! Something that is going to make my laugh so loud I'm gonna crap in my pants. And then panel 4...I nearly had to laugh at how bad the anti-climax can be. Not because there was a joke, but because I can't imagine anyone actually uploading such a comic thinking it might be funny.

Humor is something unexpected. We start off with something unexpected, and in the end we turn to completely what is normal and expected. Isn't that the complete opposite of humor?

that's just sad. you guys didn't even get 713..OF COURSE isn't he ACTUALLY messing with the advertisers.. that's the absurd and (slightly) funny part about the whole damn thing.there's something called sarcasm. and irony. you should look it up on wikipedia you stupid fucks

(11:48:48 AM) person1: i lol'd(11:48:49 AM) person1: because(11:48:50 AM) person1: oh man(11:48:52 AM) person1: just yesterday(11:48:56 AM) person1: i was telling a friend of mine(11:49:00 AM) person1: about randy's pseudo feminism(11:49:03 AM) person1: and then he comes out with this(11:49:10 AM) person1: i can so be like "I TOLD YOU SO MAN" now(11:50:14 AM) person1: is that an actual thing? porn for women?(11:50:20 AM) person1: if so, randall totally doesn't get the joke(11:50:27 AM) person1: if not, then fuck you randall(11:50:47 AM) person1: man, why did I google porn for women(11:50:52 AM) person1: what made me think this is a good idea(11:50:55 AM) person1: incidentally(11:51:01 AM) person1: why does randall watch porn for women

"A statement that, when taken in context, may actually mean the opposite of what is written literally; the use of words expressing something other than their literal intention, notably as a form of humor." - Wiktionary

This is not an irony. Were it an irony, it would focus on the very falseness of the statement. Instead, it focuses on the possible (and completely irrelevant) implications of the statement's introduced "truth".

Yes, there is such a thing as "Porn for Women":http://www.amazon.com/Women-Cambridge-Womens-Pornography-Cooperative/dp/0811855511/But he simply failed to get the joke of the author of the book.

Still my post holds though, it was an exceptional form of anti-humor. Luckily Randall fails at producing humor as, when it mixes with anti-humor, who knows what would happen?

It's like saying... "Selling books from Amazon? I buy my books from places, you know, they actually have brick buildings or an Internet connection". Except that "Amazon" isn't a joke but simply a name.

"This is not an irony. Were it an irony, it would focus on the very falseness of the statement. Instead, it focuses on the possible (and completely irrelevant) implications of the statement's introduced "truth"."

Same Cuddlefish here. My apologies, there are other situations in which a statement might be considered an irony. However, this joke is not one such situation.

It's kinda funny if you read it as Megan being an angry feminist writing a screed against Porn for Women after hearing about it second-hand and then after being informed it's a joke going "well it's still not funny that's not something you joke about because women are still being oppressed and yadda yadda yadda" to cover up the fact that she was dumb and didn't get the joke.

4:19it doesn't fit, though. He's clearly trying to be witty by emphatizing that women enjoy regular porn as well. This could be funny if the source material was serious (i.e. maybe an actual porno in household setting)

I get most of the criticism that this blog makes, and it makes some pretty good points, but why do you insist on making tenous links between "sarcastic, smug, leet haxoring people closely modeled on Randall Munroe's ideal view of himself?", as if Randall has some kind of superiority complex? Why do it? It discredits your argument, quite frankly.

Today I noticed a strange lack of xkcd on my RSS reader... then I remembered I canceled the subscription. Ahh...

Anyway: "Porn for Women" actually exists and it's pretty obvious it's a joke book. So, is Randall doing a joke on a joke? Is the joke that Megan didn't get the joke? Or the biggest joke is that Randall didn't get the joke? Is there any joke at all?

Also: seriously, why is he spelling out the joke's subject? If the reader knows what the book is, the first panel is useless and boring. If the reader doesn't... this comic is regarded as the apex of nerddom; Google exists for a reason, gottdamnit!

And now, for something completely different... the heads are connected! I'm actually surprised.

my biggest complaint is that (I doubt randall didn't understand it - maybe he SAW IT AND DIDN'T THINK IT WAS FUNNY (thanks 6:04, that made me lol)) it's not criticizing fembitches because, look at it. Look at the wording, he really believes in this.

Funny: the comic is a complaint about that "Porno for Women", and the way it is done is pretty much exactly what could be called "Porno for Feminists". Do women and feminists in general really need that kind of inane, obvious, hamfisted and heavyhanded crap?

Randall, I don't know how your fanbase is, but the average man around these parts would NOT take a woman to bed with that kind of cheap White Knighting attitude; so, please, stop trying.

Everybody keeps saying it, but let us make this perfectly clear, lest the Cuddlefish try to muddy the water:

1. the book "porn for women" is a joke book

2. randy wrote a joke based entirely on the premise that this joke book is actually a real thing and wow how absurd it is it's crazy

therefore:

3. there is no way in which this comic is funny.

corollary:

4. anyone who says this comic is funny is an idiot. not just the usual "firefly? maths? vaginas? THAT'S HILARIOUS" type of idiot, no, we're talking about randicksucking of a profound level as of yet unrecognized by modern dicksucking science

Agreed, it doesn't make sense to call this "messing with advertisers" because no one is going to see that. Now cuddlefish might reply, "But people read the comic!". Oh yeah, but that's no reason for the characters to do something. It's horribly contrived.

I'm sick of "your mom" and "that's what she said" type jokes. I don't care whether it's in the comic or only the alt-text. It's stupid either way. I hate any such "internet cultures" that consider such phrases as inexhaustible sources of humor.

714: Terrible. Either the joke is just the terrible joke I think it is, or it's so terribly written that you can't tell what it makes fun of.

"Psh...to imply that a chicken would cross the road for any specific purpose is absurd. More than likely a chicken wouldn't have any concept of the existence of a road. Chickens tend to wander randomly in search of only food. If a chicken were to cross a road, it would more than likely be the result of mere coincidence, as opposed to the reason outlined by you. Your joke is obviously not funny because it relies on things happening that wouldn't actually happen in real life. Now, in response, I'd like to present my own joke: I don't like your sense of humor. Haha! I slay me!"

@anon 9:34 - The 'chicken crossing the road' joke should not be used as an example of a simple joke everyone knows, because it's a fairly tricky meta-joke that depends on a sizeable amount of understanding of the structure of humour and general joke-literacy.The analysis appropriate for a simple straight-up Joke is not appropriate for the 'chicken crossing the road' joke.

Getting back to today's strip -- the problem is its need to ennoble the geek, instead of highlighting the innate humor. There *is* a joke here. In fact, there's two potential jokes here.

1) The computer user browses a questionable website. Advertisements come up. He is credulous, and says he needs to take an unplanned EVA. The reason? The website claims there are hot chicks in Low Earth Orbit waiting to meet him! Ba-dum ching.

Are these great jokes? No. But they're better than what we got. But then, one requires the nerd be credulous, and the other requires the ad to be accurate instead of a scam. And neither of those, as I said before, make the nerd out to be superior.

It reads that way, which probably messes up his usual intention to say "see, hot nerd girls, I totally get you".

Although I think the comic would be more XKCD if it were a woman trying to raise drama through Amazon reviews. If she'd then criticised the authors of a romance novel for using flowery language, thus disguising the fact that women have bodies, the punchline of "people fuck" would contrast the example of "honeyed moss" or whatever. It's an old joke, but at least it's a joke.

There are like three people on the forums that understand that the book Porn for Women is a joke and the others are pretty much dudes saying "Ha ha you tell them, Randall, women can like sex just as much as we do! We're so empowered by feminist ideals and are fighting for their freedoms!"

Yet somehow these are the same people who laughed at the astronuats looking at an ad degrading women in just the last comic. WAY TO BE CONSISTENT.

I don't think so: the way the final panels are presented, that seems much more intended to be a Horatio Sanz-esque "Crowning Moment of Awesome" than a "deuhhhr I don't get jokes" thing. I may be cynical, but I doubt this comic is wittier than it seems at first glance. There's nothing indicating irony here.

Wow, 714 could have been done in a much better (although not to say good) way. I am not a writer or a very creative person, but here goes:

The stick figure chick is given the book by a male friend, who would obviously be giving it to her as a hilarious and original joke. Maybe add something about it being a wedding gift, just to make it clear that he's not her significant other, and because I hear lots of people whining that they were given the book as a wedding gift. She is clearly annoyed at the sexism, and in her annoyance, matter-of-factly tells her male friend that in her porn, people fuck. This makes male friend INCREDIBLY UNCOMFORTABLE, because he does not think of her in that way, and only intended the book as a silly, harmless gift. Maybe add a wordless panel, just to drive the point home that the guy is uncomfortable, or in true Randall fashion, include an extra panel just to include the guy saying something like "Awkwaaaaaard" or "Wow, I'm really uncomfortable" or "...I didn't want to know that". Just kidding, don't do that last part.

Boom, comic that makes more sense, and now has the message that if you were thinking of giving the book as a gift, which apparently lots of people do, you're not being that funny or original, and the recipient of the gift doesn't find you so. It shows that women like sex to the men who treat their sexuality as a joke, and is now directed at men buying the book, instead of the authors of the book. Because the way it's written now, to the authors, doesn't make any sense. They already know that women's porn would include fucking. That's the joke of the book.

Anyway, this edit still doesn't change the fact that this comic is a dude standing up for women unnecessarily.

I dislike the idea of a guy (i.e. Randy) telling other people what women want.

Unless a friend of his specifically made the joke and asked him to post it (in which case he should acknowledge her as the actual creator) it just comes across as massively presumptous.

Randy is uncomfortably close to:"I'll have the steak, and the lady'll have a salad""Actually I wanted the lamb?""...No, the salad for you I think. Don't want you getting fat on me harharhar."Except he thinks he's being gentlemanly and understanding by standing up for the womenfolk.

rob is counting him sex with himself, guys, that is why he is saying this.

also, where is this idea coming from that Randall is super wealthy? I know he makes an income off his comic but that doesn't mean he makes a giant income off it. There are benefits of making a living off comics (more fun, easier schedule, fame) that would make it worth it even if the income was less than, say, NASA engineer.

see, again, that's not plausible. and is ignoring the fact that there are girls on the internet, but that's the sort of assumption basement trolls such as yourself tend to make reflexively.

let's define "xkcdsuckers" as "everyone who has XKCD Sucks in their Google Reader feed," or 295 people. this is an arbitrarily low number (last I checked we get something like 1700 hits/day). let's further assume that Randall manages to have sex four times per day. this is an arbitrarily high number.

in order for the "xkcdsuckers" to have more sex than Randall, only four of them (or about 1 percent) would need to have sex once every day, or eight every other day, up to 28, a little less than ten percent, having sex once a week.

assume for the sake of simplification that our demographics are American and over the age of 18. assume further that the census bureau is accurate in its estimation that 41 percent of Americans over the age of 18 are single and unmarried. assume further that single people never have sex. assume that the "xkcd sucks" demographics are somehow twice as single as the rest of the population--about 82 percent. this leaves 18 percent who are not "single and unmarried," or 53. of this 53 people who are in a relationship, only a little over half of them would have to manage having sex once a week in order to equal Randall's four times daily. only four of them, a little less than ten percent, would have to have sex once per day to equal his numbers.

alternatively, assume that the Durex survey is accurate in assuming four percent of people have sex daily, and that "xkcdsuckers" are so pathetic that among this demographic that number is reduced to 1/4-- so that only one percent have sex daily. that still equals Randall's numbers. add in the finding that fifty-seven percent report having sex weekly; reduce this number to about 1/6, so that only ten percent are having sex weekly, and this still equals Randall's numbers.

combine the statistics and even assuming that everyone not either daily or weekly never has sex at all, and the aggregate of "xkcdsuckers" doubles the amount of sex Randall has.

A preachy, irony-deficient monologue that completely misses the point of the subject matter, delivered by a sex-obsessed perma-adolescent who hopes that masking his desperate insecurity with condescending reminders that he's a Nice Guy Who Really Understands and Respects Women, Unlike Those Other Jerks will finally earn his way (back?) into Megan's heart and/or vagina.

I'm still not sure how basic statistics and simple maths and listing assumptions can be perceived as desperate. desperate is saying "NUH-UH I HAVE TONS OF SEX." and I'm not even sure what "needy" means in this context, since I expressed no desires at all.

I'm just saying that asserting that one person, especially Randy, having more sex than any given aggregate of 300 people is highly implausible. I'd make the same argument w/r/t the XKCD forumites.

oh, and a word of advice for trolling in the future? you should probably avoid saying things like "we all think so." it really damages your credibility, especially since the bulk of the commenting community posts anonymously and has no means of communicating. demonstrating an overwhelming consensus among anonymous posters is difficult at best, and impossible when you are the only person who has expressed the opinion.

it is actually a lot more effective to avoid the temptation to pretend to speak for the community; it masks your intentions, makes you appear more honest and less presumptuous, and keeps people from assuming that the anonymous posts that follow agreeing with you are just sock puppets. it also helps to respond to specific lines and points, so it's clear that you aren't just making your attacks without actually putting any thought into them.

of course, any attacks on someone's personal life on an internet forum or commenting community are fairly ineffective, since your knowledge of them is limited to their posts on said community, and it very seldom actually rings true, especially when it's as uncreative an attack as "you never get laid" or "you are lonely and desperate." but if you stop pretending you know how a bunch of anonymous people who have not expressed any opinion think you'll at least be slightly more persuasive.

"I'm still not sure how basic statistics and simple maths and listing assumptions can be perceived as desperate."

The collective anonymous aren't able to distinguish feelings within writing.

Seriously, so many people think you're being dead serious when you aren't saying "LoL" or inputting smiley faces at the end of your sentences. Still others think that a disagreement means you're angry.

To quite a few people who don't read enough, if writing doesn't have a giveaway (e.g. I am angry, LOL, or expletives), most people consider the writing to be matter-of-fact, devoid of feeling, and the writer completely disengaged from his writing.

To sum it up, someone arguing with you does not imply desperation. Someone who doesn't say lol or haha isn't always unhappy. Someone who isn't swearing may in fact be very angry. These are basic skills to learn, Cuddlefish. I am disdainful.

Ken: according to the American Heritage Dictionary, as a slang term it means "A sexual partner, especially a woman," which means that it usually refers to women but does not exclusively. I've definitely known straight girls and gay men to use the word. I guess I assumed it was being used in a gender-neutral sense, since I don't see any reason to exclude ladies and gay men from your consideration.

TheMesosade: hmm yes. I assumed it was because our cuddlefish fans start with the assumption that we are lonely, desperate, and repulsive. I think it's kind of a feedback loop starting with "they disagree with me, therefore they are angry, and they spend time talking about it, therefore they are pathetic" and then everything they read further reinforces the hate.

it's just really hilarious to me when people take a really dry list of statistics and mathematical assumptions and assume that it's "desperate and needy." it's like they've completely divorced themselves from reality at that point.

Well Rob, the way I read it, you were screaming every sentence at the monitor while tears and snot ran down your face. And don't try to tell me you weren't, the subtext was there, clear as day. Also it took you 30 minutes to type because you had to headbutt each key.

actually I hit the keys with my penis because otherwise it doesn't serve any function at all, because every time I look at a woman she shudders in revulsion and, if she has a drink, throws it in my face.

OH BOY, YET ANOTHER PLEA TO SEND HIM FREE STUFF. MAAANNNN Carl, you are such an internet celebrity! We really care about what you think on stuff other than XKCD, because that is really the reason as to why we come to this blog. Quickly, let us all ask that one author of that one other random comic he constantly pimps (that actually sucks ass) to sacrifice some money and send it to him for free.You're often late and short with posts as it is, but we can forgive that!

Also, today's comic was shit in a shitcan. The punchline is that people fuck! What a wacky concept.

See, I actually know more about computers than I do history, so it's probably not that. Unless this is some sort of Dan Brown effect, where knowing what Randall's talking about impairs my ability to appreciate his works.

new one is stupid, but I'm not sure if Randall including typical phrases like "I have IQ" and "I have a/an inch penis" is supposed to be poking fun at people who do that on the internet, or if he's trying to get people to laugh at infantile humour as usual.

Also, as a TNG fan, the "there are four lights" joke is not funny, and putting that joke into a shitty comic putting it on a graph is even worse

Wait...there are four lights is inherently a joke? I thought it was a meme/reference. I thought it only became a joke BY hiding it in a graph (whether it's good is another matter).

Curious why he did number of boy/girlfriends but only did boyfriends for age + boyfriend.

Also...the line splits off at grade 8 for the junior/senior thing? I guess I don't understand American school terminology as well as I had thought.

I agree the graphs are a bit off. I particularly think the IQ graph has a bad trendline. Also, the average in the alt-text doesn't appear to match the graphs, unless he's using the mode average for some reason. Why does 8 glasses of water a day get a mini hump but 18 and never had a boyfriend doesn't?

I kind of am interested that "I'm a C-cup" doesn't get much play. I guess C-cup women are satisfied? I suppose the 18 year old / no boyfriend is a psychological thing with graduating from high school.

What the hell is this?

Welcome. This is a website called XKCD SUCKS which is about the webcomic xkcd and why we think it sucks. My name is Carl and I used to write about it all the time, then I stopped because I went insane, and now other people write about it all the time. I forget their names. The posts still seem to be coming regularly, but many of the structural elements - like all the stuff in this lefthand pane - are a bit outdated. What can I say? Insane, etc.

I started this site because it had been clear to me for a while that xkcd is no longer a great webcomic (though it once was). Alas, many of its fans are too caught up in the faux-nerd culture that xkcd is a part of, and can't bring themselves to admit that the comic, at this point, is terrible. While I still like a new comic on occasion, I feel that more and more of them need the Iron Finger of Mockery knowingly pointed at them. This used to be called "XKCD: Overrated", but then it fell from just being overrated to being just horrible. Thus, xkcd sucks.

Here is a comic about me that Ann made. It is my favorite thing in the world.

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When he's not flipping a shit over prescriptivist and descriptivist uses of language, xkcdsucks' very own Rob likes writing long blocks of text about specific subjects. Here are some of his excellent refutations of common responses to this site. Think of them as a sort of in-depth FAQ, for people inclined to disagree with this site.